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Project xCloud
Project xCloud is an upcoming video game streaming service that allows Xbox games to be played on a wide variety of devices. Development Development for Project xCloud has been going on for many, many years before its first announcement during E3 2018. Work on the service has been reported to have been going on since 2013, with games such as Halo 4 successfully running on a range of smart phones. Due to the service being too costly at the time, work was scaled down on xCloud. During E3 2018, head of Xbox Phil Spencer officially revealed that xCloud was still being worked on and stated that they planned to expand it to the Xbox One range of consoles and the next generation of Xbox as well. While little detail on the service was announced at E3, much more information would be revealed in months to come. A few months later after the small tease at E3 2018, Project xCloud finally got an official announcement through Microsoft's YouTube channel. The video showed details of how the service would work and showed numerous Xbox One games such as Forza Horizon 4 and Halo 5: Guardians being played on smart phones and tablets with and without Xbox controllers. During this video Microsoft confirmed that they planned to merge four custom Xbox consoles stripped-down into modular server blades to get the service to work. Combined with Microsoft's 54 Azure reigons across the world, the tech giant plans to build more of the infastrctures across countries to keep the service running at a smooth rate all the time no matter where the player may be. As noted by many website, Microsoft has an advantage over competitors. This advantage is experience. The Xbox One is already capable of easily streaming its content and gameplay to any Windows 10 PC over a local network. This will make it slightly easier for Microsoft to develop xCloud. During GDC 2019, Microsoft discussed how they are adapting games to work with xCloud, with their new Cloud Aware APIs will allow developers to build upon existing Xbox One code with device-aware features, only enabled when streaming a title. Trials At E3 2019 Microsoft announced that public trials would begin to role out later in the year. The dates for public trials was then revealed to be mid October. Only a limited number of people were slected to participate in the original trial. Users that wanted to apply for the trials had to be from the United States, the United Kingdom or South Korea. These original trials were only available on Samsung smart phones, with an iPhone trial expected to be held at a later date. Three games were available for the first trial they were; Halo 5: Guardians, Sea of Thieves and Gears 5. An additional 50 games were announced for the trial at X019, including Forza Horizon 4 and Crackdown 3. The trial was ran through the Xbox Game Streaming preview. To successfully participate users needed the app, a Android device with Android version 6.0 or greater, an Xbox One controller and a fast internet connection. In January 2020, Microsoft announced that trials would now be available to all regions that the Xbox One is available in. To join the trials the same requirements had to be met as before. Release Microsoft is yet to discuss release dates for its game streaming service, however, is began running "public trials" in 2019. Microsoft hopes to test varying "volumes and locations" with these tests. In 2017, Phil Spencer estimated the Xbox streaming service will hit the market "in the next three years" setting its full release date for 2020, or prior. Despite indications of a 2020 release for Xbox Scarlett, it is expected Project xCloud to ahead of the console. Games Microsoft has discussed several major Xbox One games headed to Project xCloud. Various games were seen in the announcment trailer such as- Forza Horizon 4, Halo 5: Guardians, Gears of War 4, Sea of Thieves, and Cuphead streaming live via the technology. Titles like Rockstar Games' Red Dead Redemption 2 have also been named, which are also expect on the service. In Microsoft's initial announcement video for Project xCloud, they touched on the seamless onboarding process for game developers. Microsoft also stated that studios will have the ability to deploy their games with "no additional work," indicating a hefty lineup should be on the horizon. Microsoft did announce at E3 2019 that all Xbox One games would be available to stream on iOS and Android for Xbox One owners from Fall 2019 at no charge. Currently 50 games can be played within the trial with more to be added over time. These games include the following. * Sea of Thieves * Killer Instinct * Gears 5 * Halo 5: Guardians * Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night * Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons * theHunter: Call of the Wild * Ace Combat 7: Skies Unknown * Rad * Soulcalibur VI * Tales of Vesperia: Definitive Edition * Tekken 7 * WRC 7 * Devil May Cry 5 * F1 2019 * For the King * Absolver * Madden NFL 20 * Vermintide 2 * Vampyr * Conan Exiles * Mutant Year Zero: Road to Eden * Hitman * Mark of the Ninja: Remastered * Dead Island: Definitive Edition * TERA * World War Z * Black Desert Online * Sniper Elite 4 * Puyo Puyo Champions * Just Cause 4 * Shadow of the Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition * World of Final Fantasy Maxima * ARK: Survival Evolved * Borderlands: The Handsome Collection * WWE 2K20 * Overcooked! * Yoku’s Island Express * Battle Chasers: Nightwar * Darksiders 3 * Hello Neighbor * Subnautica * World of Tanks: Mercenaries * World of Warships: Legends * Crackdown 3 * Forza Horizon 4 * Gears of War: Ultimate Edition * Halo Wars 2 * Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice * Ori and the Blind Forest: Definitive Edition * ReCore: Definitive Edition * State of Decay 2 * The Bard’s Tale IV: Director’s Cut Videos Project xCloud Preview What Is Project xCloud? Project xCloud Gaming with you at the center Inside Xbox Introducing Project xCloud Project xCloud Public Trials (ft. Gears 5, Halo 5 Guardians, Killer Instinct and Sea of Thieves) Gallery project-xcloud-blades.jpg project-xcloud-center.jpg project-xcloud-cuphead.jpg project-xcloud-forza.jpg project-xcloud-galaxy-s9.jpg project-xcloud-halo-5.jpg See also *xCloud Test Game *Xbox Game Streaming preview External links * Project xCloud (Preview) on Xbox.com * Project xCloud on Window Central Category:Streaming services Category:Unreleased Category:Xbox One Category:XCloud